A traveler seeking information about the local area corresponding to the traveler's location has limited options. For example, highway signs indicate the presence of certain types of facilities, such as gas stations, restaurants, lodgings, hospitals, and automatic teller machines (ATMs). Some highway signs will indicate which specific brands of facilities are located at a particular highway exit.
Similarly, travel books, travel agents and advanced research can provide additional information to the traveler whose situation is sufficiently static and known beforehand so that arrangements can be made. For example, when a traveler knows his or her schedule a day in advance, a travel agent can make reservations at a preferred provider of lodging at a particular location.
These known methods, however, suffer several shortcomings. First, some of these methods do not provide a satisfactory detailed level of information. Highway signs that indicate the presence of lodging at a particular highway exit, do not indicate the size of the hotel, room availability, price, and available services. Information with this added level of detail would be very helpful to a traveler.
Second, some of these methods cannot provide a mobile travel information that is time-dependent. In other words, the provided information is static and cannot be easily updated in a manner that is as dynamic, for example, as the traveler's movements. Highway signs are not updated frequently enough to indicate newly added or removed facilities and cannot provide detailed time-dependent information, such as room availability at a hotel. Travel agents cannot easily modify a traveler's travel plan where those travel plans rapidly change.